by Sarah Winman
The sun had eaten the wind and a tender quiet hovered over the creek stifling the caw of crows in the smudges of nests high in the pines. His spirits lifted when he saw the familiar yellow oilskin traverse the dry riverbed, two cups of tea held aloft in her hands.
Help is here, help is here, she cried.
He met her at the bank and took the tea from her. He took her arm, and pulled her up the slope.
I’ll be dead by the time you’ve finished this, she said, and she lowered herself into the deck chair. Tea please, she said, and Drake handed back her cup. She took a sip. Lovely, she said. Who made it?
You did, he said. Lovely, she said, and closed her eyes.
He watched her doze. The silence oozed and dripped as thickly as syrup and emotion caught like pollen in his throat. He became aware of the majesty of the landscape, of the hard work and lives that had toiled before, hands that had left dirt and blood on spades and cups. And there, a bee clinging to the pink trumpet head of a foxglove, not resting, not feasting, but dead. A connectedness to all, that’s what he felt. A rare earthed feeling of belonging. A burst of sunlight fell upon trails of shimmering web, linking all – the dead, the living – to the earth.
39
The chimney sweep arrived at the bakehouse the next morning to remove a swallow’s nest that was blocking the oven flue. Soot and webs were swept clear from all stacks and no mortar and bricks fell and the structures rose safe and clean and ready to smoke into the blue Cornish sky.
The proving cupboard and the table were bleached, the windows cleaned, the floors swept then scrubbed. Peace went upstairs to the two bedrooms and had the uneasy feeling that a large black spider dominated the corner of each. They were sad rooms full of whisperings and she had trouble opening the windows. It’s not that they were locked, they just wouldn’t give in to her: stubbornness inherited from the previous owner, she thought. She took a while to decide which room she would take as hers. She chose the front room that looked out across the High Road and meadow down towards the wood and river below. She scrubbed the sloping, uneven floor and cleaned the windows but the sadness remained. She didn’t know what to say to her room because the room stayed deaf to her words. For the time being she would sleep downstairs in a chair.
The moving van arrived early afternoon and soon a bed and a chest of drawers took position in the front bedroom. Two suitcases of bedding and clothes. A rug and a side table were positioned expectantly in the back parlour. But it was into the kitchen that a whole new world arrived: boxes of pans and baskets and cutlery and notebooks. Bags of flour and two baths and a wash basin and logs and candles and lanterns and coal. The last thing to be delivered was the old bakehouse sign: Gently with Peace. It was dented on the way in.
Peace worked throughout the night, feeding the oven until it glowed orange, then glowed white, and kneading and flouring and watering the shiny mound of greying dough. She cut the lump into a dozen rounds and oiled and basketed those rounds and put those rounds into the blistering heat until magic happened and a dozen loaves were rising and crusting perfectly. Sun up, the kitchen was fragrant and humid with the smell of sourdough and yeast and freshly baked bread, and the dewy scent of morning air.
She went outside and positioned the rocking chair in a shaft of morning light. She sat down to watch life pass but life didn’t pass, so she got up and filled pans with water from the communal tap opposite. She drank from her hand and the water was cool and sweet, so perfect for baking.
She sat back down in her rocker and again waited for life to pass but nothing passed except a slow-moving hour. She got up and went over to the hedgerow and picked two bunches of oxlips and pink sorrel, one she placed on the war memorial, the other in a small vase on the kneading table. She was about to sit back down again when she caught sight of a tarnished bowl in the corner of the kitchen. She thought it was a bowl but when she pulled it clear she found it to be a ship’s bell. She tugged on the thick rope and listened. It made a good sound. She rang the bell louder this time, and upstairs and out of sight four windows unexpectedly unlatched.
40
A wind blows hot, a dry dusty wind that carries scents in its arms, scents Drake could never know, ones of baked earth and eucalyptus and frangipani, a collision, too, of salt and muck where sea meets farmland. It’s not called the sea, says a woman, it’s called the ocean.
Drake clung on tighter to the heat of the dream as he felt the bed once again, the firm horsehair mattress with its lineage of damp. Crows aggravated outside. He rolled over. Christ! his muscles were sore. His palms were tight and raw, and the dream slipped through his blistered fingers like an oily cord.
He sat up dazed, with an acute taste in his mouth. He got up and poured water from the pitcher, rinsed his mouth and swallowed hard. He went to the door and opened it wide. Butterflies were busy dusting themselves in the sweet honeysuckle blossom that crowned the doorway but that wasn’t what he could smell nor what he could taste. He dressed quickly and marched barefoot across the riverbank up into the wood. He stopped and sniffed the air. Unmistakable now.
He knocked loudly.
Marvellous? he said, excitedly. He heard a groan, then a shuffle. Marvellous? he said again.
The door opened. What do you want now? she said.
Have I just died and gone to heaven?
You won’t be going there, she said, firmly.
Can’t you smell it, though? said Drake.
Smell what?
Bread, he said.
Bread? she said.
Freshly baked, he said.
And the smell fell over the creek like spring itself, heralding change and – more importantly – new life. And in that moment, it was as if they were castaways, and the scent of bread was like a sighted sail closing in on their uncharted shore.
It was slow going through the trees as Marvellous refused to tread on any flowers, and thousands of blues and yellows and whites now coloured the woodland floor. Across the meadow they went, through daisies and sweet lush grass until there, up ahead, they saw the curl of grey smoke spiralling from the bakehouse chimney stack. The stone building was alive again, it was breathing again, and its breath smelt heavenly. A blue van was parked outside. The words on the side, scratched and faded, read: Gently with Peace.
They slowed as they came towards the High Road and they stopped at the standpipe to drink the sweet, cool water. Wooden boards had been taken off the windows and the glass glistened in the sunlight, and behind the glass was a shape moving busily in the dark within. A battered rocking chair took position to the left of the doorway and next to it, on its original cleat, was Mrs Hard’s ship’s bell, its brass dome glistening like gold.
Who’s there? shouted Marvellous. Show yourself, she called out, raising her stick.
And, as if on cue, the curtains of history drew back and the front door opened and there she was. A young woman, as tall and as broad as an oak tree carrying a planter of lavender to lay against the front wall. The young woman stopped and looked up. The tarmac river shimmering with heat between them. She shielded her eyes and tried to distinguish the young man and old woman standing by the water tap. The young man waved at her. She waved back and began to cross the road, excited that life had ventured by. But then she stopped. Aware, suddenly, of who the old woman was. And with the sun at her back, she became a giant dial casting a long steady shadow towards Marvellous and a long-gone time.
Is that you, Peace? said Marvellous.
And Peace nodded and ran towards the old woman who had so carefully, so lovingly, so rightly delivered her into the world.
41
They sat around the large oak table with its vase of oxslips and pink sorrel, and its long-gone memories of a long-gone time, and Peace retold the story of her life with Wilfred Gently. She moved from table to stove, from stove to oven, from oven to cupboard and the story wen
t with her, in the laying out of plates and the steeping of the tea. When the loaf was cool enough to cut, she sat down with her guests and handed Drake the knife. Marvellous noticed that the young woman could barely look at him. A faint blush, like a forgotten smear of jam, clung to her cheeks when he thanked her and smiled at her, when he stood up to take the knife. To cut the bread. To offer her the first piece. Butter? he said.
That was my parents’ home, wasn’t it? said Peace, looking out, pointing to the cottage opposite.
No, said Marvellous, joining her at the window. That was Gladly’s home.
Are you sure? said Peace.
Quite sure. She was the first child I delivered. You were my last.
Then where did my mother and father live? asked Peace.
Come, said Marvellous, and she took her arm and the three of them left the bakehouse and strolled up the High Road. It was when they got to the last cottage, the border between man and nature, that Marvellous said, This was their home.
This? said Peace, quietly.
It wasn’t always like this, said Marvellous. It took the brunt of the winds, the brunt of people’s moods.
I was born here?
Yes.
Peace tried the front door, she pushed against the mud-caked windows.
All locked, said Marvellous.
I’d like to go in, said Peace.
Going in is going back, said Marvellous.
I know, said Peace. I know, she said again, a little less sure.
Ouch! said Marvellous, lifting her hand to her hair. What’re you doing back there, boy?
Drake held two hairpins in front of her face. Stand back, he said, and he knelt down to the keyhole and inserted the pins. Magic word? he said. Nonsense, said Marvellous, and the lock clicked and the door creaked open under the weight of a tentative hand.
Inside, the cottage was dark and gloomy. Webs draped like curtains and rats scuttled to dark holes in dark corners, and the smell was of damp and decay and the something other that inhabited the space between her broken parents.
It’s so sad, said Peace.
It wasn’t always so, said Marvellous.
In the far corner of the room, an unexpected shape caught Peace’s eye. She turned to Marvellous and said, A piano?
Good times came here once. And song.
There was no money for a piano, said Peace.
There was money once, said Marvellous.
But a piano? said Peace.
He won it.
What?
Cards, I think. I don’t remember now, but he got it fairly and squarely.
But who played it? asked Peace.
He did.
My fa— I don’t understand, said Peace. He played the piano?
Played beautifully.
Peace went over to the piano. She ran her hands over the battered upright mass. The splintered wood and broken strings looked to her like a bludgeoned body. Pigeons now nested in the cavity of song.
Did he do this? she said.
Grief did. Anger did, said Marvellous. Stopped him taking it out on something living, I suppose.
The sound of rats scratching startled. Peace shuddered and disappeared into the back room.
What happened here? whispered Drake.
Death, said Marvellous. After the boy died – after Simeon I mean – the village believed they were cursed and they became very fearful. They believed the boy should have died in France like the others and not taken his own life back here. And that was enough to start tongues flapping, and flap they did, oh yes. Loudly, and outside this front door. Horrible words, Drake. To a family in grief. People can be very cruel. Frightened people especially, and Marvellous reached for his hand and squeezed it tightly.
What’s this? said Peace, coming back into the room, holding up a perfect willow hoop decorated with feathers and shells.
Ah, said Marvellous, bringing the hoop close to her eyes. This, she said, is a rumour-catcher.
A what? said Drake.
A rumour-catcher. She said, My mother taught my father how to make one, and he in turn taught me. As you can see, the hoop is woven with fishing line to form an inner tight web to catch the rumour. Razor-shells, hang down like this – and she demonstrated – to cut the rumour away from the source, and whelk shells hang down too to house the rumour. Lastly, feathers from songbirds surround the catcher, to purify the rumour and to cleanse the air for good.
But how did you know if a rumour had been caught, asked Peace.
Because of the sound, said Marvellous. Rumour has two very distinct sounds. When it flies free the sound is similar to a ship’s hull scraping against a harbour wall. But when rumour is caught, the sound is of expiration: like a fearful sigh in the vacant dark whorls of long-abandoned shells. And Marvellous pointed to the whelks.
She knew these sounds well because she’d had a rumour-catcher outside her caravan and it had caught many over the years, most having been carried on the breath of Mrs Hard. She’d launched rumours like royalty launched ships. It had hung not too far from the wind chimes although the songs were very different. The principles of catching rumours were, in fact, similar to the principles of catching dreams, but because rumour was weightier, the catcher had to be positioned closer to the ground. Rumour flew low, dreams flew high and somewhere in between were prayers.
Catching a rumour before it spread was very important, said Marvellous. But some rumours passed even me by and multiplied like germs.
What ones? asked Drake.
The ones about Simeon. That’s why I made this for your mother.
Peace took the hoop and lifted it to her ears.
Do you think I’ll ever hear rumour? she asked.
I hope you don’t, said Marvellous. It’s not a good sound, really not a good sound. Not something to wish for, my love.
And they closed the door and locked up the past and silently wandered back down the High Road with a rumour-catcher held under an arm. Drake let the two women walk hand in hand ahead. He stopped at the war memorial and looked at the space where a name should have been.
42
Ned Blaney was out in the bay running two lines from the back of his boat. Ever-dependable Ned with his shock of thick curls bleached white by the sun, oh you could recognise him anywhere. Should’ve been snatched up ages ago, everybody said so. A deep thinker, he was, even before the war. But war had made him quiet; as quiet and as deep as the channel he fished.
He was fishing for himself that day; kicking back, a quiet moment between man and boat. He leant across the seat and adjusted his radio till he found a familiar song. These Foolish Things. Oscar Peterson on piano. He sang along, hummed when he didn’t know the words.
He reached down to his feet for the Thermos flask, unscrewed the lid and poured himself a cup of tea. He touched the lines briefly, checked for the flick of life. Nothing. He turned the radio up. A brief thought about war but he let it pass like a floating mass of knotweed.
He raised his cup to the sky even though he didn’t believe in Heaven, but he had to put his brother somewhere and the familiar blue cushion above the estuary was as good a place as any.
To Old Times, he said.
43
Old times returned to the creek, and life became busy and expectant, and the valley echoed with the sounds of bridge-building and a young woman’s laughter, and Marvellous was suddenly wrenched out of old age like a seed potato wrenched out of the familiar comfort of dark. She had little time to think about Death, pushed aside as it were, by activity, youth and noise. Things were required of her again and this time by people and not by dreams. And Marvellous blossomed, having quite forgotten what an exciting and necessary jolt being needed gave.
But what are you looking for? she said, as Drake disappeared into her
shed.
Paint, he called out.
But what kind of paint? she said.
Any kind, said Drake.
But there’s lots of different kinds.
Just paint, said Drake.
But there isn’t just paint, she muttered.
Drake backed out and looked at her, exasperated. Any paint, Marvellous! Whatever paint you have.
I only have one kind of paint –
– that’ll do.
And Marvellous squeezed into the shed and moments later came out with a tin of gloss for boat hulls.
Cobalt blue, she said. Perfect he said, and he ran into the woods without saying anything more.
She was about to settle down for a rare afternoon of quiet when she heard the sound of bicycle wheels clatter over the woodland floor. It was the postman, a man who never came now that everyone she knew was dead.
Letter! he shouted, as he puffed his way down to the riverbank.
I hear you, said Marvellous, walking up to meet him.
The fella addressed it to Miss Marvellous Ways, Gypsy Caravan, Falmouth Wood, Cornwall, said the postman. But this ain’t Falmouth Wood, is it? So it’s been round the block a few times till it ended up here. But at the bottom it says United Kingdom. The last two words he pronounced emphatically and clearly. This ’ere’s from abroad, he said.
Abroad? said Marvellous.
Aye, said the postman. Feels like a postcard inside, and Marvellous took the envelope from him and offered him a cup of tea and a saffron bun. Next time, he said, declining the offer on account of his full sack.
She undid her oilskin and sat down on the mooring stone. She wiped her glasses and studied the stamp: America. She said the word out loud. She opened the envelope and, sure enough, a postcard was inside. She brought it up close to her eyes: a river at sunset. A wooden bridge and trees growing out of water.